The 2006-07 ABS Performing Arts Survey found that at the end of June 2007, there were 726 organisations in the performing arts operation industry in Australia. Of these, 180 were mainly engaged in popular music performance, 143 in drama production, 102 in symphony and choral performance, 77 in musical theatre production, 36 in dance production, 34 in circus production, 16 in opera production and 137 in other performance or production such as puppetry, ventriloquism etc.

In 2006-07, there were 14,368 drama productions with 3.1 million paid attendances. Dance productions had the least performances and attendances with 1,398 paid performances attracting 527,600 paid attendances.

* estimate has a relative standard error of 25% to 50% and should be used with caution

(a) Paid performances are related to headline acts only, support acts are excluded.

Source: Performing Arts, Australia, 2006-07 (cat. no. 8697.0).

Performing Arts, Australia, 2002-03 (cat. no. 8697.0) provided data on the activities of organisations which were involved with performing arts festivals. The survey only included those festivals which lasted more than two consecutive days and which were either multifaceted (i.e. multiple performing arts components and non-performing arts based activities) or had a primary focus in one of the genres of the performing arts, such as music or drama. The survey found that there were 176 performing arts festivals during 2002-03, 91 of which were music festivals, 75 were multifaceted, while the remaining ten were drama, dance or comedy festivals.

According to Clubs, Pubs, Taverns and Bars, Australia, 2004-05 (cat. no. 8687.0) there were 194,769 paid live performances in pubs, taverns and bars and 114,082 in clubs in 2004-05.

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